[Balmung] Server Issues, safety, and overcrowding

[Vexander]

They should name Balmung (THEE unofficial RP server) and a few of the low pop servers as Official RP servers and allow free transfers for a limited time from Balmung to those low pop servers, maybe the last 2 months before the expansion hits.

RP communities on any given game are rarely so large they could survive not being collectively gathered on a single server. I don't think FFXIV is an exception to this rule. Its not impossible to see a mass migration, mind you, just extremely rare. I remember in WoW when Moon Guard first launched as a new RP server the scattered community of RP'ers all went there. Then came the raiders cause the old servers didn't feel quite so alive and RP'ers generally played well enough to fill a spot in a raid if needed. Then came the Trolls because they were left alone on the old servers and had no one to troll. Then Goldshire was born...

[Fuma]

They should name Balmung (THEE unofficial RP server) and a few of the low pop servers as Official RP servers and allow free transfers for a limited time from Balmung to those low pop servers, maybe the last 2 months before the expansion hits.

RP communities on any given game are rarely so large they could survive not being collectively gathered on a single server. I don't think FFXIV is an exception to this rule. Its not impossible to see a mass migration, mind you, just extremely rare. I remember in WoW when Moon Guard first launched as a new RP server the scattered community of RP'ers all went there. Then came the raiders cause the old servers didn't feel quite so alive and RP'ers generally played well enough to fill a spot in a raid if needed. Then came the Trolls because they were left alone on the old servers and had no one to troll. Then Goldshire was born...

This is a census of ACTIVE players

Source: https://ffxivcensus.com/

Seems if they decided to call it an official RP server and maybe add 1 or 2 more I'm sure the game would still do fine (not add new servers but assign the RP tag to them). The problem now with the community is as we move into a lull period at the end of the expansion you start to see the true players, the ones still logging in consistently and if you're NA you're either on Balmung or Gilgamesh or you suffer because of it. By adding the RP tag to some of the servers it could help spread out those groups more evenly and by having a free transfer promotion it'd make it easier on FCs or groups of friends to make that move. This would also help correct low pop servers so they can thrive as well.

[Bourne_Endeavor]

snip

This has been attempted numerous times; each resulting in the smaller RP communities dying or inevitably transferring to Balmung. The largest secondary attempt was actually Gilgamesh but didn't last for the reasons Vexander said. Roleplay is a niche hobby. You ideally want to congregate as many people together for variety in writing and character development. That can't happen if everyone is spread out. Black Desert, WoW, Blade & Soul all have one server where everyone goes. SE could make an RP official server separate from Balmung. All that would happen is either the entire RP community migrates there or everyone stays on Balmung due to its population.

[Fuma]

-snip-

I'm not sure you understood my post correctly. What I'm saying is for SE to make them official RP servers instead of ones that community has decided to name that. Similar to how you see servers when you make a new character say legacy, they could do the same for RP so that new players who want this know where to go. Not everyone is going to want or come to a forum just to find this out. An official label would go much further than the ramblings of the forums, a small portion of the FFXIV population come here or any other forum for that matter to get info like that. And I wouldn't say the RP community is small and niche, there's more people interested in it than you think.

[Kosmos992k]

This is a census of ACTIVE players

Source: https://ffxivcensus.com/

I'm on Behemoth, and to be honest with you I am not sure of the accuracy of the above graph. The reason I say that is that character creation is almost perpetually locked on Behemoth, in fact Balmung and Behemoth seem to be locked about as much time as each other. Yet that graph indicates an active population on Behemoth about half of Balmung. It doesn't make much sense for Behemoth to be locked so often if it's population is comparatively lower than say Balmung or Gilgamesh.

[Fuma]

I'm on Behemoth, and to be honest with you I am not sure of the accuracy of the above graph. The reason I say that is that character creation is almost perpetually locked on Behemoth, in fact Balmung and Behemoth seem to be locked about as much time as each other. Yet that graph indicates an active population on Behemoth about half of Balmung. It doesn't make much sense for Behemoth to be locked so often if it's population is comparatively lower than say Balmung or Gilgamesh.

From the top of the source page
(Any reference to "Active" players, refers to players who have the wind-up aymeric minion from the 3.3 story)

A paid transfer doesn't get blocked out by server population which explains Balmung's inflation even though it's restricted. Shoot, your server could be at/near what SE thinks of as an acceptable amount.

[Shougun]

Not sure if a town is the best place for wildly random chat but at least compared to Cross Roads chat I don't really find Balmung's Ul'dah that bad - sometimes weird stuff but "usually" things I don't think a GM would do anything about because it's not a significant issue.

I sort of think of it like real life, you walk around and see people kiss each other and swear, and as you walk by you can hear their conversation. RP / simulated conversations if you get close (RPers generally do not use /yell /shout).

I guess I just expect some goofy things to go on, it's why you join or leave general channels in WoW if you wanted to be "immersed" or hear someone's twitter feed lol. Perhaps they should add channels to certain active zones, like main cities. If you post about your favorite color in the looking for party channel GM will take that far more seriously than if you talked about it in general. Recruit and trade could be others. Although you could always create and enhance other systems, and leave the chat system alone, making general even more for general only and encouraging people to leave general if they don't want that sort of thing. Like a trade/crafting request sort of "party finder" tool, or a way to advertise your FC without posting chat a whole bunch.

That said, not being able to play with your friends is a big bummer.. Wonder if they could offer a modified server transfer potion, where you can transfer to your friend's server - can bundle it into the recruit a friend system and you only get the potion if you're on a full server. So you'd be able to leave by recruiting a friend. I assume you have to pay for the game for the to recruit a friend code to work, I didn't pay attention if trials count as recruiting them.

[Vexander]

Seems if they decided to call it an official RP server and maybe add 1 or 2 more I'm sure the game would still do fine (not add new servers but assign the RP tag to them). The problem now with the community is as we move into a lull period at the end of the expansion you start to see the true players, the ones still logging in consistently and if you're NA you're either on Balmung or Gilgamesh or you suffer because of it. By adding the RP tag to some of the servers it could help spread out those groups more evenly and by having a free transfer promotion it'd make it easier on FCs or groups of friends to make that move. This would also help correct low pop servers so they can thrive as well.

The thing is, you do NOT want to spread the RP'ers out. Like I said before, the RP community is not large enough in any game, generally, to be spread out. I should probably add again that even if you got all the RP'ers to move off of Balmung, it might not change anything in the long-run. Moon Guard is one of Blizzard's most populated servers. Why? Not because the RP community is so large, but because Roleplayers typically are a mature and reasonable group of individuals who are good enough at the gameplay for Raiders to to see as viable. RP'ers also create a sense of community on those servers, that a lot of players of any kind of gameplay are drawn to, even if they don't directly participate in it. In short, people tend to gather where RP'ers are. So even if we moved all the RP'ers off of Balmung, chances are within a year we'd just have a different server with overcrowding.

I'm not sure you understood my post correctly. What I'm saying is for SE to make them official RP servers instead of ones that community has decided to name that. Similar to how you see servers when you make a new character say legacy, they could do the same for RP so that new players who want this know where to go. Not everyone is going to want or come to a forum just to find this out. An official label would go much further than the ramblings of the forums, a small portion of the FFXIV population come here or any other forum for that matter to get info like that. And I wouldn't say the RP community is small and niche, there's more people interested in it than you think.

If SE did that now players would generally feel lied to since only one Server has a strong RP community. SE would also need to go out of its way to decide how an Official RP server differs from other servers. If this suddenly means things like a strictly enforced naming policy, well, there's going to be all kinds of problems.

I also think you're underestimating how many RP'ers do their homework. RP is 90% studying and researching things like the Lore and where other RP'ers are, and 10% actually RP'ing.

[Fuma]

The thing is, you do NOT want to spread the RP'ers out. Like I said before, the RP community is not large enough in any game, generally, to be spread out. I should probably add again that even if you got all the RP'ers to move off of Balmung, it might not change anything in the long-run. Moon Guard is one of Blizzard's most populated servers. Why? Not because the RP community is so large, but because Roleplayers typically are a mature and reasonable group of individuals who are good enough at the gameplay for Raiders to to see as viable. RP'ers also create a sense of community on those servers, that a lot of players of any kind of gameplay are drawn to, even if they don't directly participate in it. In short, people tend to gather where RP'ers are. So even if we moved all the RP'ers off of Balmung, chances are within a year we'd just have a different server with overcrowding.



If SE did that now players would generally feel lied to since only one Server has a strong RP community. SE would also need to go out of its way to decide how an Official RP server differs from other servers. If this suddenly means things like a strictly enforced naming policy, well, there's going to be all kinds of problems.

I also think you're underestimating how many RP'ers do their homework. RP is 90% studying and researching things like the Lore and where other RP'ers are, and 10% actually RP'ing.

Having 2 maybe 3 servers labeled as RP servers would not thin the herd so much as to "ruin" RP, if anything it'd help those that don't visit official forums know where they can go for a higher chance at finding other RPers. Look at my post a few pages back where I also show active playerbase numbers, you label Balmung and 2 of the real low pop servers as RP and you can help bring those numbers up by allowing free transfers from Balmung only to those select servers. There are a ton of people on Balmung that want to RP and feel that server is way too crowded to enjoy the game, now they have alternate places to go that will still have a good number of RPers around since it's marked as an RP server helping point others that direction.

And you're waaaaay overthinking what an RP server would/should be. All SE needs to do is mark it as a RP server just like they do with the legacy servers and thats it. Players that RP enforce themselves with the lore.

Also, your comment about RPers doing their HW I don't understand, how does that have anything to do with a conversation about offering officially labeled RP servers?

[NolLacnala]

Moon Guard is one of Blizzard's most populated servers. Why? Not because the RP community is so large, but because Roleplayers typically are a mature and reasonable group of individuals who are good enough at the gameplay for Raiders to to see as viable.

Pffthhh

I remember my FC and I mocking Balmung for one of the censuses. Top three pop but something like 0.005% clear rate bottom three of all servers, with "dead" servers pulling more raid clears.

Lolmung is the lowest common denominator server. Stop trying to cover the poo gas smell with Raider brand deodorant.